A
large portion of the oil that fuels the US economy comes from Saudi Arabia.
We burn that oil, along with other fossil fuels, such as coal and natural
gas, to run our industrialized economy. Burning the oil, coal and gas
releases carbon dioxide into the atmosphere in ever-increasing amounts,
as a result of population- and industry-driven demand in the USA.

Carbon dioxide (along
with the Chlorofluorocarbons, nitrous oxides and methane) is a greenhouse
gas. Increased emissions into the atmosphere of carbon dioxide have been
identified by hundreds of scientists from around the globe (representing
industrialized as well as developing economies) as a major contributor
to the warming up of the Earth's atmosphere in the 1900s and especially
in the 1990s. As many international scientific reports, such as that produced
by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (the IPCC), have suggested
with increasing confidence, the atmosphere has gotten warmer as a result
of fossil fuel burning and other human activities. They say that, unless
there is a sharp reduction in fossil fuel use worldwide and especially
in the rich industrialized countries, the human-induced warming of the
global atmosphere will continue to increase.

That warming will
most likely result in major changes of local and regional climates (precipitation,
temperatures, fire hazard, altered growing seasons, etc.), climates to
which societies had become accustomed in the past century. Researchers
say that nights will be warmer, extreme climate and weather events will
become more frequent, more intense and are more than likely to appear
in new locations. Inhabitants of island countries around the globe are
worried about being inundated from heightened storm surges as a result
of sea level rise of up to a meter by the end of this century.

Some governments take
the global warming issue very seriously. Others are undecided. Still others
seem not to care at all. Recently, the President of the US, G.W. Bush,
pulled the US representatives out of the negotiation process for the Kyoto
Protocol. He announced to the world in March 2001 that the protocol was
'dead', as far as he (and, therefore, the US) was concerned. What then
are people to do?

I
suggest that national government leaders in the US, including the president
and his extended family, spend their lengthy summer vacations, not in
Crawford, Texas, but in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia. Why Saudi Arabia? The summertime
temperatures constantly exceed 110 deg F, day after day after day. Water
is a scarce commodity but desalinization of seawater has been made possible
by the revenues gained from oil exports to the US and elsewhere.

This would be a useful
experience, because it would give our politicians a true feeling for what
summers in the US will be like later in the century. With global warming,
a Saudi-summer would become a standard summertime climate feature in much
of North America. The Saudi-like summers would occur in time for our children
and our children's children to figure how to survive in such a harsh,
hot-temperature climate.

Is
this really what Americans want for their future generations? I don't
think so. Politicians must start to think well beyond their next election
if they have any desire at all to protect future generations of Americans
from having to cope with Saudi summers year after year after year, and
well into the future.

Saudi Statistics
& Facts:

Climate:
harsh, dry desert with great extremes of temperature. From June through
August, midday temperature in the desert can soar to over 100 deg. F.

Terrain:
mostly uninhabited, sandy desert

Land use: arable land: 1%permanent crops: 0%

Environment:

current
issues:
desertification; depletion of underground water resources; the lack
of perennial rivers or permanent water bodies has prompted the development
of extensive seawater desalination facilities; coastal pollution
from oil spills

natural
hazards:
frequent sand and dust storms

CRAWFORD,
Texas

Downtown
Crawford

A Crawford
ranch

Crawford Statistics
& Facts:
The population of Crawford is approximately 631.
The approximate number of families is 267.
The amount of land area in Crawford is 1.623 sq. kilometers.
The amount of surface water is 0 sq kilometers.
The distance from Crawford to Washington DC is 1295 miles.
The distance to the Texas state capital is 86 miles. (as the crow flies)